Town Board approves tour vehicle rules in EVDC

Estes Park Town Board voted unanimously in favor of amending the Estes Valley Development Code (EVDC) to add "Sightseeing/Tour Vehicle Facility" as a special review use in certain zoning districts. It also approved the Estes Park Trolleys application at 1340 Big Thompson Avenue, which had been operating under two temporary use permits.

Estes Park Senior Planner Jeffrey Woeber presented to the Town Board on behalf of the Community Development staff recommendations for both action items. As he restated, the issue was first brought to the Board on Oct. 9.

"The definition had said the use may or may not involve ticket sales and customer parking," he said before reading the revised definition that the facility shall include on site ticket sales and parking and may or may not include storage of sightseeing vehicles.

The applicant, Estes Park Trolleys at 1340 Big Thompson Avenue, had an existing business in the Town. Woeber said this business, along with others like it, have existed in a gray area within the EVDC.

"Staff has determined it is appropriate as a special review use in the three zone districts I mentioned [A, CD and CO] and this is allowed only on a case-by-case site approval basis," he said.

The conditions staff recommended would be a limited number of trolley vehicles, which is the staff's recommended condition of approval. There would also be limited onsite employee and no sightseeing or tour parking for customers, among other requests that fit with the area.

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According to Woeber, Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) has not responded to the application. Estes Park Mayor Todd Jirsa recommended adding a condition that if CDOT chooses to respond in the future, as part of the application it will get addressed, which Woeber outlined a plan for.

Nick Cassatt, co-owner of Estes Park Trolleys said the company wants support the community and be there for the community year-round.

"Every month we have charters, weddings that go out," he said. "For the most part, tours slow down but we still do offer tours to people year round if we do, are able to get enough people wanting to go because this town does slow down. But it is something that we're doing and that brings more traffic, more money into the town, brings people to spend, keep us all together, right?"

Near the end, John Meissner of Estes Park spoke out before Town Board voted noting that it's fine where it is for now, but hoping that the business finds a new location.

"I hope they make enough money that they can get another site," he said. "It looks a little bit tacky, compared to other communities it looks like it's the Estes Park way of doing things. They have different colored trolleys out there right now and it just looks jammed and if they had an overarching theme maybe I wish they had a canopy or again a bus barn maybe where they could take these."

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